The Scientific Visualization and Image Analysis Core Facility is a shared facility designed to provide high-speed and parallel processing capabilities and hardwired 3D visualization and virtual reality capabilities to researchers at the University of Chicago. The facility was established during the summer of 1996. The equipment was obtained through an NIH Shared Instrument Grant. The system contains an Silicon Graphics Onyx with an Immersadesk. Currently the facility supports the computational/visualization needs of 58 faculty investigators and staff. Recent advances in image analysis techniques as well as in computer processing speeds have increased the amount of research in quantitative image analysis. Various image analysis investigations are underway at the University of Chicago Medical Center including work with x-ray images, magnetic resonance imaging and spectroscopy, and radionuclide images for computer-vision analysis and image fusion. In addition, visualization methods are being developed for analyzing blood flow and for molecular and physiological modeling. For such research, investigators need advanced computing power and visualization capabilities that are beyond the economical reach of individual investigators. The Scientific Visualization and Image Analysis Facility is important (a) to expedite the current research and (b) to prepare for the future in which such systems will become "commonplace visualization workstations", such that image analysis and rendering techniques now performed in the lab will become a part of real-time patient care.